Tag: audio reviews

The first voice activated car driver was Dr. Foster (played by David Hasselhoff in Knight Rider back in the 1980s). The voice activation system in question was the Pontiac Trans Am, the Knight Industries Two Thousand (otherwise known as KITT), and was a fully-fledged AI that functioned as Dr. Foster’s partner in solving a crime. Fast forward to 2016, where the legendary Knight Rider is about to get an exciting reboot and where voice-activated driving is no longer just something out of a TV show or an overly active imagination. And ok, voice-activated driving assistance may not quite be ready to reach full sentience and help us stop crime, but there are a whole bunch of smart voice-activated systems out there that are helping us drive better.

For starters, there is a wide range of navigation apps on the market, like Waze, that help us ditch traditional sat nav devices while benefiting from crowdsourced information on traffic, accidents and more. And of course, voice plays a big part in all of this; but if that alone isn’t exciting enough, you will be pleased to know that you can now use Morgan Freeman’s voice on Waze, for all the iconic driving wisdom you might need. Another app to pay attention to is Google Maps Voice, which lets you navigate via voice commands through your Apple or Android phone. This means no more pulling over while driving in order to update your route (yay). The app also helps you find petrol stations, restaurants, and supermarkets on your way home.

And it’s not just apps that are getting smarter; cars are getting smarter and progressing closer to the goal of AI. BMW’s voice control system now lets you control various features of your car like climate control, your sound system, and of course navigation. And instead of typing in instructions you can just tell your car to take you home and it will. The exact system you get depends on your model of car, but Dragon Drive from the Sedan 7 series is arguably one of the best. Dragon Drive allows you to talk to your car conversationally and even let’s you interrupt so you don’t have to listen to long menus. Hopefully, systems like this will help to reduce the number of car accidents caused by texting (which currently make up roughly a quarter of all crashes in the US alone).

With increasingly hands-free technology, a voice is changing the way we drive. And though there are still issues with voice recognition, voice technologies are rapidly improving, with companies like Baidu reaching a reporting 96% accuracy level. There haven’t yet been many studies on the impact that hands-free is having on drivers. One study from a few years ago suggests that voice is no safer than text in terms of distraction. However, this was based on a small sample size of just over 40 individuals and was tested on older technologies with a much lower level of accuracy. As voice tech becomes more intuitive and more conversational it will likely make driving more convenient and comfortable while also making it safer.

Heyoya is a game-changing comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

For more information about Heyoya, or to start using Heyoya’s Receiver plan and start earning money today, click here.

It has been 110 years since the very first voice over was recorded by Reginald Fessendon, the first ever voice heard on radio. Over 20 years later, Looney Toons came to life along with Mickey Mouse and many other iconic cartoon characters. Walt Disney had the honor of introducing the first ever cartoon voice in 1928. And in the 30s the voice over industry began to expand rapidly with larger and larger numbers of animated films being produced. This led to the formation of actor’s guilds and the professionalization of the industry. In the 1940s the first legal TV ad was run. In the beginning, voice-overs were anonymous “in-between” jobs and remained very much behind the scenes. This remained the case for a long time, but in recent decades voice-overs have increased in popularity with the release of major cartoon blockbusters, and the world of voice-overs has come to the forefront of acting.

There is a long list of celebrities who have lent their voice to various cartoons; just think of James Earl Jones and Jeremy Irons in the Lion King, or Edie Murphy in Shrek. And the list goes on. Over the years, voice-overs have transformed from behind the scenes odd jobs into a valuable marketing tool for the film industry. When new cartoon films come out, most audiences are looking out for which celebs will be involved. A case in point is the new movie Trolls with an all-star cast including Gwen Stefani, Justin Timberlake, and Anna Kendrick. The wide range of well-known celebrities voicing films is a useful marketing tool to target not only children but also parents.

And while the status and wages associated with voice-overs have transformed over the years, something else has been happening in parallel. The big name voice actors and celebs remain rooted in the old work paradigm of agents and auditions, and much of the industry continues to work this way. However, for a lot of voice-over actors, the bold new frontier is the online market. The voice over market has expanded rapidly on online marketplaces like Fiverr to the point where you can basically find any voice you want for around 5 dollars (you might have to pay more for longer jobs or extras but this is still incredibly cheap).

The quality can be a bit hit and miss on major marketplaces offering such a wide range of skills for money. And in response to this, a number of voice over only marketplaces have been opening up. Voices.com is the largest online marketplace for voice-overs and provides a whole range of services including radio, cartoons, audiobooks, business and more. With a lot of online marketplaces, the focus is on speed and low-cost which means that quality often suffers. But today, a number of online marketplaces have opened up to ensure that the voices customers pay for are high quality. Voicebunny allows you to scroll through and select a voice over from a wide range of professional actors.

While voice-overs continue to merge and change, they remain a backbone of the way we communicate and entertain. Now more than ever, voice and voice-overs are critical not just for advertising, but also for education, communication, entertainment and more.

Heyoya is a game-changing comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

For more information about Heyoya, or to start using Heyoya’s Receiver plan and start earning money today, click here.

While the major operating systems of Android and iOS have had varying levels of voice command for quite some time, many apps have lagged behind with only written and visual inputs and outputs. But little by little all of that seems set to change as an increasing number of apps go hands-free. Last month, Google Maps finally launched its long overdue voice feature. This is especially helpful for drivers who can now find gas stations or change their routes while they are driving without having to pull over to type, or even worse, type and drive. And according to research, you are 23 times more likely to have an accident while texting, and texting while driving accounts for over 1,600,000 accidents per year in the US alone. Hopefully, the increasing move towards hands-free voice technology will help to reduce these awful statistics.

Source: technewstoday.com

And it’s not just Google Maps that is changing the world with voice. Google’s Voice Access app allows users to completely control their phone with voice. Google has really jumped on the voice trend in a big way, and this technology, in particular, helps people with motor impairments navigate their touch screens. It still hasn’t officially released, so Google is still busy ironing out bugs, but it looks set to be a transformative technology for users who otherwise have difficulty manipulating touch screens and handheld devices.

And while Siri still runs the show on Apple, there are plenty of great Android alternatives out there. Voice assistants can really transform how you use your device, and once again, Google has a strong presence in this field with Google Now. It is reportedly one of the best voice assistants on the market and has a wide range of features and continuous updates from Google. Microsoft’s voice assistant is Cortana, another popular choice for Android users, which integrates well between PCs and handheld devices and can basically do anything a real assistant can do (ok, maybe not everything). And there are many more options out there.

All in all, voice technology is changing the way we do almost everything. In future, we may never even touch the devices we use, once everything is seamlessly activated across devices and platforms with easy-to-use voice commands. Voice activation is definitely the new wave of technology and has already been adopted and heavily invested in by all the tech giants. And, while voice accuracy is still never 100%, the stats are rapidly improving. In fact, Google, China-based Baidu, and startup Hound are already achieving around 90% accuracy. So if you haven’t started using voice, now is the time to transform the way you work and start to join the hands-free revolution.

Heyoya is a game-changing comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

For more information about Heyoya, or to start using Heyoya’s Receiver plan and start earning money today, click here.

Video games were once the realm of Pacman and Space Invaders, with various blobs moving across screens accompanied by a symphony of bleeps (don’t get me wrong, those games are still amazing). But as the technologies evolved to allow for more complex and immersive video game experiences, the characters and sounds of video games have evolved as well. The current format is like a complex and interactive film, and in many ways, the actors are as important as they would be in a film or TV show. Yet, for the most part, video game actors remain anonymous, hidden behind various animated characters.

Voice acting is a very different gig to regular on-screen acting, or to acting at the theater. For one thing, there is no set script but rather a series of optional and interactive choices. They characters and the dialogue depend on the players and the choices they make within the game. Today’s video games are often full of stunning visuals, and have great actors; but there are still problems with shoddy script writing, discrimination and more. Yet the genre continues to evolve and improve providing the world with more compelling characters and storylines in each new game.

For a long time, video game characters have been popular animated figures powered by anonymous actors. For example, think back to Lara Croft. We can all remember the movie with Angelina Jolie, but how many of us can actually remember the voice actor behind the video game? (The truth is there were actually a whole series of actors). Today this voice anonymity is starting to shift as increasing numbers of celebrities voiced video game characters. And this makes sense especially considering the top video games easily make more than similar Hollywood Blockbusters. Grand Theft Auto V made an enormous $1 billion dollars in just three days.

So who are all these celebrities lending their fame to video games? Well, Gary Oldman voiced the Call of Duty series, the incredible Sir Patrick Steward has voiced a number of games, and Ron Perlman has reportedly voiced over 25 separate video games. Emma Stone and Lucy Lui have also lent their voices to various different games. In fact, there is now a very long list of celebrity voices in video games, an industry that is reportedly worth an enormous 111 billion dollars.

But despite the celebs, the size of the industry, and its increasing development and success in recent years, the gaming industry is all set to go on strike on October 21st. The issue at the center of things is the enormous profitability of the industry versus the fact that voice actors in video games still make so much less than actors in Hollywood blockbusters. In addition, many of the actors have complained about vocally stressful sessions including screaming and shouting that can actually cause long-term damage to actor’s voices.

While the compensation issue remains to be settled, it is clear that voice is at the center of the gaming world. However great the visuals are, without a compelling storyline and realistic characters, video games just wouldn’t have the same appeal to target audiences. So paradoxically, while the technologies are moving us further away from the real world, voice remains the center of things, anchoring the games in a real-world and almost personal connection with ever more elaborate characters. And this is just the beginning; VR and AR look set to completely revolutionize the gaming industry. Provided actors are compensated fairly, the future of gaming is all set to look and sound fantastic.

Heyoya is a game-changing comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

From start to finish, the US presidential campaign lasts nearly two whole years (going from initial committees to presidential inauguration) and costs millions if not billions of dollars. According to estimates, Hillary’s campaign may be as costly as 2 billion dollars, while Trump has reportedly pledged to spend 2 million dollars per week. Overall, this may be the most expensive election to date with experts predicting a total cost of up to 5 billion dollars. And unlike other countries, there is no legislation regarding the length of official campaigns, which makes America’s presidential campaign one of the world’s absolute longest campaigns ever. But as we near the end of October, November 8th no longer seems so far away. And if you’ve been blogging about this election, then it’s been quite a marathon, but we are now just about ready for the final sprint.

Source: www.graphics.wsj.com

How to stand out in a presidential avalanche

It’s been a dramatic battle between Trump and Clinton, and the latest polls show Clinton holds an 11-point lead over Trump, quite likely as a result of Trump’s leaked tape and the sexual assault allegations against him. The media has been writing, posting, videoing and generally sharing non-stop content about these allegations, about Trump and about Clinton so that it almost feels there is nothing else going on in the world except these elections. And in terms of the content itself, as with all content, it ranges from shockingly low quality to Pulitzer prize worthy journalism. But with events such as this one, the big question for bloggers and content owners is how to make content stand out in an avalanche of presidential material.

Make your readers the center of the political debate

While there is no easy answer to make your content shine amongst the millions of other Hillary vs. Trump articles and blogs, there are a couple of things that can help increase your reach. For starters, your focus should be on generated a user debate and not just on generating your own content. Your content is the jumping off point, but the real action is in the talkbacks and comments from your users. And if that alone isn’t persuasive enough, research has shown that user generated-content is an extremely influential form of media that has more views, a higher click through rate and lower costs.

Give your users a voice (literally)

In the world of user-generated content (or UGC), there is tough competition. Pretty much every blog or website has a vibrant comments section, and social media allows for even more interaction. And according to some (quite scary) studies, 70% of readers don’t even bother reading anymore, they just read the title and skip straight to the comments. With such a strong focus on UGC, a great way to draw more attention to what you do is to improve the way your readers interact and comment on your content. And while comment platforms have been exclusively built for text and image based communication, there is now a new trend in voice comments. Giving your users a voice (quite literally) might just be the best way to make your election blog stand out.

Heyoya is a game-changing comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

For more information about Heyoya, or to start using Heyoya’s Receiver plan and start earning money today, click here.

What started with Siri has expanded to other technologies like the Amazon Echo and Google Home in the smart home sphere, and personal assistant alternatives like Cortina, Viv and others. With a multitude of voice services on the marketing, different platforms are competing on functionality, breadth of knowledge, usability across devices and more. One of Siri’s issues has been its stark absence on Mac over the past few years, but thankfully that has all changed with the launch of Sierra. In any case, one thing is clear; as more people transition to using voice services and platforms, an increasing amount of voice content is being created. And this changes the digital marketing landscape and the way in which people search for and view content. As voice becomes increasingly popular as a form of media, so does voice search.

Source: medium.com

A change in the essence of search

With word searches, people have become used to typing in key words to find the content they are looking for. Marketers have based much of their content strategy on this and finding very niche goods or products have more often than not been a question of typing in the right key words. With voice, the way people search is different. Instead of honing into the key questions, voice searches are more conversational, largely based on full questions, and more reminiscent of what you would ask a real-life personal assistant. According to research the occurrence of the words “who” “what” and “how” in searches has increased 61% in the past year.

Marketing needs to be more conversational

This dramatic change in the way people are searching necessitates a change in the way brands, products, and services are marketed. In order to capture an audience that is searching for colloquial questions, your content must be of a kind that addresses those questions and does it in a conversational way rather than exclusively through key words and meta tags. And while it is always necessary to do customer research and build your marketing in a way that taps into your key audiences, in 2016 it might be worth researching the kinds of questions your target audience are asking. Ideally, your sites and blogs should be based on both traditional SEO keywords and semantic voice relevance (ie. voice-based questions and context).

Increase voice-based content

While voice searches are mostly throwing up text-based content, with the increasing improvements in voice analytics it won’t be long before voice searches find voice-based content. To stay ahead of the trend and keep users on your site for longer, it is already worthwhile incorporating voice content into your website or blog. This can start out with something simple like voice snippets of your bio on your blog or a voice pitch of your best selling product. Ultimately, though, one of the best types of content is the user-generated kind, which is always perceived to be much more authentic than brand generated advertising and content. To harness both the voice and user-generated content trends, it’s worth exploring the world of voice comments and reviews.

Heyoya is a game-changing comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

Voice-activated technologies apps and gadgets are taking the world by storm. So why is voice becoming so popular and what are the coolest new technologies out there? For one thing, gadgets, in general, are becoming ever more convenient and often convenience=hands free. Giving users the ability to take care of tasks and use apps without having to touch a smartphone or device gives people the freedom to do more while they are on the go. You aren’t allowed to text and drive, but you can voice activate your apps while driving and keeping your eyes firmly on the road.

A wireless world

With the launch of Apple’s iPhone 7, the world seems to be moving towards technologies that are smoother, sleeker and paradoxically both more and less connected; more connected because they allow you to do more with your time and your network, but less connected because they have less physical ports. The future (or at least the one Apple is pushing towards) eliminates the headphone jack and is slowly transitioning us to a wireless world. Samsung has been using wireless charging for years now, and let’s face it if we think of the science fiction visions of the future they are almost always wireless (just think about the complete absence of wires in Star Trek or Star Wars for example). In this new and exciting wireless world, voice and voice activation has become an essential tool.

Source: iphoneincanada.ca

Smart homes get a voice

Google has been working extensively on the next generation of smart home technology: a tiny device known as Google Home. It looks set to launch on October 4th and it is all about voice control. Overall, the product isn’t so different in terms of functionality to Siri, whom we all know and love. It works to give us voice control of our homes and can connect with other Google based devices like Nest. It has a lot in common with the sleek and formidable Amazon Echo, which has now been on the US market for about 2 years. Both are tiny, wifi connected and able to control all the appliances in your home through voice. And the Amazon Echo is about to launch in Europe in a few days. For now, there is no AI involved so users get all the functionality without the harrowing AI story of shows like Black Mirror’s White Christmas.

Have a chat with your motorbike

You probably heard of Night Rider, the 1980’s show with a talking car. Well, existing technologies are now one better than this, allowing you to talk with your motorbike (ok, not literally). The Skully smart helmet brings motorcycle riders an augmented reality experience with a blind-spot camera and heads-up display for greater safety and a better ride. And of course, the whole thing is completely voice controlled. And yes, the world of voice-activated cars is also continuing to evolve, bringing drivers better and better voice controlled activation, infotainment and more.

Voice transforms technology

As well as allowing us to move towards a vision of a hands-free world, where we can do everything and anything on the go, voice technologies are actually adding a personal element back into technologies, which are otherwise very impersonal. In addition to talking to your cars, helmets, homes and devices, users are increasingly talking to each other on bite-sized voice recordings via messaging services like Whatsapp and even through voice comments and reviews. Hearing another human across the bot filled and automated online world adds a welcome personal touch to the medium and also helps eliminate much of the ambiguity associated with text-based communications.

Heyoya is a game-changing comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

For more information about Heyoya, or to start using Heyoya’s Receiver plan and start earning money today, click here.

In our fast-paced world with new technologies being developed every second and whole new industries appearing out of the blue every day, it seems like everyone is always talking about innovation. But what does innovation really mean? Innovation is actually harder than you might think to define. If you start googling it you will come up with a never-ending quantity of quotes and ideas. Just take a look at a few expert opinions. At first glance, there seems to be a cacophony of thoughts and ideas. Some say “innovation is relative”, some say “it is a process that brings new ideas”, and some say “innovation is simply an idea”. And those are just a few examples; there are much more out there! So which is it? One thing that the experts seem to broadly agree on is that innovation brings something new to the table and that often this is linked to the creation of value and competitive advantage.

Innovation is not invention, or is it?

One of the areas where people seem to frequently get confused with innovation is when it comes to figuring out the difference between invention and innovation. The concept of newness is applicable to both ideas. When we think of invention, great moments of spring to mind like the creation of the wheel, the creation of telephones, the creation of computers and many more leaps of human creativity. So are these moments also innovation or innovative? And how can we define or understand the overlap between the two (assuming there is one)?

Some people argue that the easiest way to look at the two concepts is through a Venn diagram. In this model, innovation is the space where invention (newness) meets the market (utility, creating value). So it is possible to have a great invention without being innovative if you fail to create market value. But even here there are disagreements, with many people claiming that invention is the creation of something new while innovation means incrementally changing or improving something that already exists.

Source: keyword-suggestions.com

These days the terms innovation and invention are often used as if they were one and the same, and the truth is, the term innovation has become something of a trendy buzzword that is now added to pretty much every idea, start-up, marketing plan and new technology out there. If we look to the Oxford Dictionary (aka the holy grail of language) we find that both invention and innovation refer to the act of newness and creation. It’s actually hard to pull apart the difference between the creation of a new, method, idea product and something that has been invented. So perhaps the truth of the semantics is that in the modern world “invention” has evolved into “innovation”, and perhaps this is because when it comes to new creations in the modern world, the focus (now more than ever) is on creating something new that can be brought to market, and most importantly, to create something that creates value.

Heyoya is an innovative comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

Do you remember the movie Her where (spoiler alert) a man basically falls in love with his computer operating system? The movie introduces us to a brave new world of voice where flesh and blood personal assistants are a thing of the past and where Siri has evolved to scary new heights. The crazy thing is that this level of voice control doesn’t even seem very farfetched. Ok, so maybe the current voice-based technologies and operating systems haven’t quite evolved to the point of singularity, that potentially terrifying place where artificial intelligence overtakes mankind, but even with today’s technologies, the voice seems to be hurtling us forward into the future.

Source: quotesgram.com

New hardware aside, this month marked the launch of iOS 10, and with it a much more advanced voice technology. Siri has added features that allow you to better control more apps and even send messages through third party apps (yay!). Multitasking is a lot better and Siri has even extended its field of control into smart homes. So now you can control the temperature, humidity, security (and more) of your home through voice. Siri is basically already a functional personal assistant even if her voice isn’t quite as sexy as Scarlet Johansson’s. And if Siri isn’t good enough for you, then check out the next generation of Siri, an artificial intelligence called Viv, created by the founders of Siri (they left Apple and now they want Viv to reach every one of your devices).

And the thing is, the voice is everywhere, not just on your phone. Through Kaizena, for example, the voice is revolutionizing education by allowing teachers to give their feedback to students in the form of a voice recording that is linked to specifically highlighted text. This is much more personal and a lot less ambiguous than the comments feature in standard word processing software. Even better than that, speech is a whole lot faster than type and doesn’t require your hands. So you can create totally hands-free comments in seconds.

So what has voice done to change the world of e-commerce? Well, in recent years consumer-generated content has arguably overtaken brand created materials in terms of importance. One of the biggest components of this is product and service reviews. Pretty much every e-commerce platform, store and marketplace have some sort of reviewing platform to allow customers to express their opinions. Voice is now entering the world of e-commerce and changing the way customers interact. With Heyoya, customers can share voice snippets instead of text, and store owners can share product pitches, special offers and more, in a way that is much more personal.

And voice is also influencing the blogosphere (and we are not just talking about vlogging). Written blogs always take the time to find striking images and infographics to support their stories, but voice adds another unique dimension. With voice comments, bloggers can literally hear their reader’s opinions, eliminate ambiguity and react faster. And using voice comments is a great way to help a blog stand out from the crowd in a world that is still primarily focused on text, GIFs and emojis.

Heyoya is a unique comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

It’s surprising how many time businesses in 2016 fail to bring together the correct components to build a comprehensive marketing strategy. The world today is still full of companies that build and fall in love with magical technologies without giving enough thought to how they will bring those technologies to customers. Similarly, there are still too many companies out there that see marketing as a potentially dispensable part of their business strategy to be added on only after the rest is done and dusted. So, what can you do to build the kind of marketing strategy needed to get your business to the top?

Bottom up research

The bottom line is, to be successful you cannot use the old philosophy, “if you build it they will come”, and in fact, marketing always needs to come first and foremost. The best businesses begin with bottom-up research (Professor Danny Warshay of Brown & Yale has a whole bunch of amazing talks on this). This means starting with your customers and really working to listen and understand their needs. This research is the number 1 step of any good marketers toolkit because you cannot proceed further without a base of knowledge and understanding. As well researching and speaking to your potential customers and understanding their behaviors, it is important to get a clear understanding of the industry you are entering, the current solutions and your competition.

Set reasonable goals

Are you psyched up after doing some wonderful research, have you built an in-depth understanding of your user base? Are you ready to charge into some marketing? Hold on just a second; it is time to step back and set some realistic goals. What are you actually aiming towards? What is a conservative estimate? What’s an optimistic estimate? It’s ok if you don’t meet each of your goals word for word in exactly the timeline you’ve set out, but it is important to have something to reach towards.

Find the right marketing mix

Once you have your research and goals in place, it is important to find the right marketing mix for your business. Sadly there are no simple answers here, so it is really a question of finding the tailor-made solution that works best for you. It might be that content campaigns are your best friend, or perhaps advertising banners on specific websites are the only real way to engage your target audience. Then again, maybe a few key strategic partners can get you more bang for your buck. There is probably no single channel that will meet all your goals, so the real question here is how to strike the right balance. Part of this will come through intuition and logic, but part will likely have some element of a trial and error.

Be flexible

Your customers and your industry will change over time. New competitors will enter the market and old ones will pivot or disappear. There are no static processes. You will need to keep your eye on the constant state of flux and quite possibly redo parts of your research or change your overall goals. At a certain point, you tried and tested marketing mix may no longer work as new technologies and ideas hit the market. In order to stay on top of things, you will need to stay agile and keep a close eye on industry changes. And don’t be afraid to try new tools and new technologies.

Heyoya is a unique comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya’s new Receiver plan allows for quick and easy below-the-fold monetization. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.